1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a substrate processing apparatus for coating, for example, a semiconductor wafer, or an LCD substrate with a resist, and developing it.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, for example, in a process of photolithography in the fabricating process of a semiconductor device, a resist coating processing for forming a resist coating film on the surface of a semiconductor wafer, and a developing processing for performing development to the wafer after performing exposure to the semiconductor coated with a resist, are carried out. The resist coating and developing are conventionally carried out in accordance with a predetermined sequence adding an exposing process in between in a complex processing system in which various corresponding processing units are installed in one system, for example, as known from Japanese Patent Publication No. Hei 2-30194.
In the semiconductor device, the circuit pattern thereof is recently fined and intended to highly integrate. Therefore, for example, when a predetermined pattern is exposed to the semiconductor wafer by, for example, an aligner such as a stepper, precise positioning is performed to transfer a fine circuit pattern accurately, and precise temperature regulation and the like are performed to prevent displacement due to thermal expansion and heat shrinkage caused by a slight temperature discrepancy.